How to cook pizza on a barbecue

[MoonshineBen]

Difficulty: Beginner

It’s quick and easy to make a crispy and delicious home-made pizza on your kettle barbecue that will have friends and family coming back for more.  

Here’s our simple step-by-step guide how to make pizza on your barbecue.

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Video Tutorial

Steps

Step 1

Mix 500g of pizza flour, 330mL of warm water and a sachet of instant yeast in an electric mixer with a dough hook for about six minutes. Place dough on a floured surface and knead by hand until the dough is elastic, then form into a rough ball and set aside to rest for an hour.

Step 2

Make your pizza sauce by sautéing onions, tomatoes and a garlic clove in olive oil. Add red wine, basil and oregano. Simmer until soft, then blitz and sieve until smooth.

Step 3

You’ll need to light your barbecue charcoal briquettes inside your chimney starter before putting them on the barbecue.

Choose a flame-proof surface and fill your chimney starter with charcoal briquettes. Place a firelighter or some newspaper soaked in olive oil underneath the chimney starter and light it.

Once the coals are burning you’ll need to wait until they’re “ashed over” (completely white). This can take 10 to 20 minutes.

Step 4

Prepare your kettle barbecue by placing your lit coals on one side and adding some lump charcoal on top of them. This will turn your barbecue into an oven.

  

Step 5

Position your pizza stone on a trivet in the middle of the grill and close the lid. Allow to heat to about 230C.

Step 6

While your barbecue is heating, stretch your dough out and place down on a floured board. Add your sauce and toppings.

For our pizza, we used baby spinach, home-cured bacon, Italian sausage, cheese, pepperoni, diced tomato and oregano.

Step 7

When the barbecue is at temperature, dust your pizza stone in flour and then place your pizza on the stone. Close the barbecue lid.

Step 8

Check the progress at 10 minutes and rotate the pizza if needed. It will be cooked when the base is crispy and the cheese has melted.

Step 9

Slice and enjoy.

Materials

• Barbecue charcoal briquettes and lump charcoal

• Pizza flour

• Water

• Sachet of instant yeast

• Fresh cherry tomatoes

• Onion

• Basil

• Red wine

• Oregano

• Garlic

• Toppings of your choice.

Tools

• Kettle-style barbecue

• Pizza stone

• Trivet

• Charcoal chimney starter

• Stick mixer

• Pizza paddle (helpful but not essential).

Images

[MitchellMc]

Wow! That looks delicious and really simple, too, @MoonshineBen.

I need to get myself a charcoal BBQ so I can be cooking delightful food like this. Do you think this would be possible on a hooded gas BBQ if you cranked the heat right up and then switched off the middle burners where the pizza stone is going to sit?

Many thanks for sharing.

Mitchell

[MoonshineBen]

Thanks, @MitchellMc, you can absolutely achieve the same effect in a gas BBQ. I love the charcoal for the wood-fired taste.

As long as you have the stone on a trivet to hold it off the plate, you're all good.

[Noyade]

Hi Ben and Mitchell.

To my eyes the pizza doesn't appear 'crispy' on top? Are we missing that downward heat with this process?

[Noyade]

Just before Christmas last year Coles were selling gas powered pizza ovens that looked like this....

They were selling them for $299 but as they failed to sell the price continually dropped and I bought one around the $200 mark.

The thing that attracted me was the blurb on the box stating that the oven could reach a temperature of 510 degrees C and as a result cook a full-sized pizza in 60 seconds.

I'll type that again - 60 seconds.

I followed the instructions to the letter.

The ceramic plate was very thin - it never heated up enough to cook the bottom of the pizza and you had to rotate the pizza "every 20 seconds".

It did cook the edges and you got that "leoparding" (as the pizza purists say) but the middle of the pizza never cooked even after 15 minutes.

Rang the company - but you could only leave messages.

Quickly returned.

Anyone try one of these?

[MoonshineBen]

Hey @Noyade, depends on how you like your pizza I guess. The crispy base is the aim for me, but if you wanted to crispier on top, I'd probably raise it closer to the top of the lid which is where it would be hottest. Maybe prop it on a couple of bricks.

[Noyade]

Thanks Ben.

"I'd probably raise it closer to the top of the lid which is where it would be hottest. Maybe prop it on a couple of bricks."

I did try that technique on this "pizza maker" but in the end no matter what I tried the base burnt before I was satisfied with the top.

I'm certain the people who make these things - never actually try them out.

I have seen at Bunnings a mini enclosed pizza oven that sits onto the barbecue grill. Have you seen/tried it?

Cheers!

[EricL]

Hi @Noyade

Did you use regular charcoal or heat beads with the chimenea pizza maker? I find that the heat beads give off a more uniform release of heat. I know it might seem overkill, but I suggest getting a Matador Surface Infrared Thermometer. This will help you to control the overall temperature inside the chimenea. When you reach that sweet spot of 250C degrees you can babysit the chimenea so that it stays at that temp allowing you to get that crispy top you really want. 

Although using the tried and tested "palm" method is handy, it's often not accurate. The increased temperature inside the chimenea accelerates the cooking of the outside of the pizza and leaves the inside uncooked. I've yet to see pizza dough get cooked in under a minute and have it nice and crunchy inside and out. Just like a regular oven please keep in mind to pre-heat your chimenea before putting the pizza in. 

If you lower the temperature inside the chimenea to 240C degrees you can leave the pizza inside for at least 8 to 10 minutes, for a crispy top 15 minutes maximum. But I suggest testing the top at 10 minutes to avoid overcooking the pizza. I recommend doing a few test runs with your chimenea at the recommended temperature, it should produce better results.

I'll have mine with lots of cheese and bacon, please.

Eric

[Noyade]

Hi Eric.

I used heat beads.

Tried various quantities.

Moved the pizza further up the 'chimney' but your pizza gets smaller. 

The top just never 'crisps.'

I believe I tried everything. It was a cheap buy from a dying Masters sale. So no real loss.

These days I get better pizza cooking results with one of those Kmart mini-electric ovens where you can adjust the heat on BOTH top and bottom elements.

I've now relegated the chimenea to cooking with a large cast iron pan and for winter heat outside, consuming red wine.